As I have mentioned before there is a guy I work with that raises show cattle. When he has heifers born that don't fit into his herd he sells them to me to use for mine. Show cattle and production cattle, while both are beef, are used differently. While a calf might not be top of the show ring she can still be top of a production herd because it may just be a little flaw in her that is the difference between first place and everything else in the ring. She will still produce lots of calves that produce lots of meat.
I was fortunate to get some of his cows last year and this year as well as a heifer. I found out he had two more he wanted to sell last week so I took them as well. They will make great additions to the herd. The first on is a black white face, she is a Hereford x Maine Anjou x Angus cross.
Next is the shorthorn. She is a sister to the other shorthorn I got from him in the spring. She looks very nice. I am excited to see how she does!
There are some changes that will be occurring here on and around the farm over the next few months. I will get more into that another day after the dust (or right now mud) settles. In the meantime the neighbor, whom he and I help each other out a lot, were shooting the breeze after dinner the other night and decided to get on
Tractorhouse.com to browse for a future bale chopper for the farm. While there we came across something else that caught our eyes. It is a 12 ton wagon running gear with a custom made round bale bed on it. It is literally the same size as my trailer. I was able to scoop it up for less that the running gear itself is worth and it is barely used at all. With a little tweak of the end racks to shorten them some I will be able to haul 14-18 bales at a time with this wagon from the field to the wrapper. Most bale wagons on the market are set up for 6-12. Furthermore, the starting price for a bale wagon that hauls 6 silage and 10 dry bales is $1000 more than this one cost me. We couldn't pass this one up so I went ahead and got it.
I unloaded it off the trailer and greased all the pivot point and put the tongue back on and headed over to the neighbors to get some of the bedding bales I had over there to bring back to the house.
If you notice there are only 11 bales on the wagon. There are a couple of reasons for this. First of all the bales have been setting for a while now and were squatted down so they are wider than they should be. Also, I mentioned an adjustment to the end racks. 5 bales side by side that are just made measure 25', the wagon is 24' just like my trailer. However, a squatted bale measures a few inches wider and the end racks on the wagon hit the bales near the middle at the widest point. So what Scott and I want to do is shorten them so they hold the bales on but allow them to over hang a little so I can comfortably fit 10 on the first layer.
I have a herd check on Tuesday to pregnancy check, vaccinate, de-worm, etc. I needed to clean the barn now because it is quite warm and nothing is frozen and the manure pack was getting deep enough that the gates wouldn't swing easily. So, Scott and I cleaned the barn, including the pig pens, and stockpiled the manure to compost it and then bedded with fresh bedding.
When I got done and headed in to feed I found Baby Girl waiting in the pig shed for her daily bucket of milk! She has come a long way from the very sick calf she was when I found her. While I was cleaning the barn I let her run in the yard. She went all the way up to the back door of the house and said hi to my wife and then run around the yard and the driveway and bales eating some of the grass that is still green and enjoying the day just like a puppy!
We also have another new addition to the barn yard. Her name is Mistletoe and someone dumped her out of a car up the road at my parents house. They have too many dogs to have cats and I needed a good mouser cat for the barn so I brought her here to give her a home. She settled in quick and is already part of the family. She uses my box I made to haul pigs for her house and we keep food and water for her out in the barn. She is already catching mice and her reward is getting to lick out the rest of the milk from Baby Girls bucket each night!
I got a nice picture of the cows enjoying the fresh bedding. The stars of the photo are my daughters two girls, Princess and Lilly. Lilly is quite cute and will almost let me pet her. With a little work she could be taught to halter lead and go to the fair. I will let my daughter decide if she wants to do that.
The last picture for today's post is of one of this years bull calves. He is a red angus x charolais x black angus cross. Quite a good looking calf. Looking forward to see how he finishes out.
I will post the results of the herd check in my annual New Years post next week. I hope every one had a great time with family over the holidays and I hope everyone is looking forward to the new year as much as I am! It is going to be great!!!!
Talk to everyone in a few days!!!
Kenny
